


Sergeant Cognac Cutie Pie and Other Excellent Names For Dogs

by buttcat



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Animal Transformation, Curses, M/M, Size Kink, Small Dogs, get it lmao, kinda bunker!fic i guess, literal fluff, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-19
Updated: 2015-04-20
Packaged: 2018-03-24 19:17:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 18,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3781324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/buttcat/pseuds/buttcat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's something wrong with Dean. Really wrong. Sam mostly just wants his brother back (and less furry).</p><p>**!!! NO BESTIALITY HERE WE DO NOT PLAY THAT WAY !!!!**</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. the one with the puppies

**Author's Note:**

> soooOOOO this has been sitting in my drafts for literally over a year now??? i honestly cannot remember why i wrote this but w/e, i edited it a little anyway and now you fuckers can deal with it. welcome to the fic no one asked for or wanted
> 
> ETA: if you are here for the porn, head on over to the second chapter. that is the place to be.

 

"I don't - fuck, Sam, I don't feel so hot," Dean says. He looks pretty shitty, actually; pale, sweaty skin, sunken eyes, shaky hands.  

"Probably the tuna," Sam suggests.

"M-maybe. Fuck, feels like my stomach's doing gymnastics."

"Maybe you oughta get to the - "

Dean bolts down the hallway. Sam hears a door bang open hard against a wall and distant, spasmodic retching.

"- bathroom," Sam finishes, turning a page. "You get to clean that shit up!" he adds. He hopes his brother's cognizant enough to aim for the toilet and not, say, the floor, or someone's bed. There have been far too many accidents in the past.

Castiel wanders in about an hour later, plate of scones in hand. They look mostly edible, but with the stuff Cas makes, you never really know.

"Where's Dean?" he asks, drawing nearer. The smell of citrus and baking soda wafts through the room.

"Oh," Sam says. "He's in the bathroom, I think. I hope. He's sick or something."

Castiel looks very concerned. "Is he all right?"

"Eh, he's had worse. Probably just a bad sandwich."

"Well, let him know I made scones when he comes back. Here, try one."

Sam accepts a scone.

"Orange peel, basil, and walnut," Castiel says proudly, after Sam's taken a tentative bite.

"That's - uh. Very inventive. Thanks, Cas," Sam says. "Why don't you go check on Dean?"

"Oh - of course. I'll just leave these - yes."

He waits until Castiel's back is turned to pass his floury, gritty mouthful into a napkin. They were better than the last attempt, at least. No pineapple-chocolate medley.  

Sam can hear Castiel knocking on the bathroom door. "Dean," he says. "Dean, are you all right? It's Castiel. Dean? If you don't answer me, I'm coming in. Dean?"  

The door opens and, a millisecond later slams shut. Castiel tears into the kitchen and Sam tries to look like he hasn't been ripping off pieces of his scone and hiding it under the other scones for the past five or so minutes.      

"Sam," Castiel pants. "Sam, we have a - um - we have a situation."

Sam sighs. "Look - just leave him. He'll get pissy if anyone tries to clean him up."

"No, Sam, you don't understand," Castiel says. "He's - please, just come. Please."

Sam heaves himself up and follows. It's not like he hasn't caught his brother in all sorts of compromising positions over the years, right? What's one more time seeing Dean conked out and half-dunked in the toilet?

Castiel edges the door open just a crack and Sam crowds in, ready to - huh. Well. That's a new one.

"Right," Sam says. "Okay. We're gonna need to move him. There are holding cells in the basement, right? Awesome. All right. Hey, Dean, buddy," he says, edging closer to his comatose brother. "You in there?"

Dean moans pitifully and tries to clutch his knees further into his chest.

"I know, dude, I know. Well, actually, I don't, but - look, we gotta move you, okay? Can you work with us?"

"Sammy," Dean whimpers. "Hurts."

"Shit. I'm gonna take care of you. Don't worry, I gotcha." Sam hoists his brother's arms around his neck, tries to ignore how they're twisting and bending into themselves unnaturally, the way his fingers are fusing together, thumb drifting up his wrist. The tawny fur that's sprouted up his neck.

"What's wrong with him?" Castiel asks.

"Can't say for sure, but - could you do me a favor and go check the calendar? For the moon cycles," Sam explains.

Castiel's eyes go wide. "Oh," he says, and scurries off.

Sam deposits Dean in the center of one of the iron-barred cells in the basement and hopes it'll be enough. He cuffs his broken, ever-shifting hands together as an extra precaution, even though he knows Dean'll be able to tear through the metal rings like paper, if he is what Sam thinks he is - .

Sam thunks his head back on the frigid stone wall. Goddammit, Dean.

He slides down to the floor and sits, watches his brother writhe and jerk in the cell. Sam can hear his innards moving, sick, ripping, squelching noises, and Christ, how is his brother not screaming with it, howling through the pain. Dean'd always been stoic in the face of injury - gunshot wound, broken leg, knife to the gut, none of it phased him - but this, this is his body tearing itself apart, rearranging itself, and Sam knows, he knows without a doubt what it feels like to have your organs stretched around your bones, remembers Lucifer remaking and manipulating his body past its breaking point, and he'd yelled his throat raw the entire time. But Dean only pants and, sometimes, whimpers, tiny, choked-off cries through clenched teeth. Sam wants to cup his brother's face, tell him it's okay, he doesn't have to hold back. He understands, he understands, so please, just stop hurting, just, God, Dean, please be okay.   

Castiel scurries into the room, calendar in hand, and Sam feels like he's betraying his brother's privacy, like he shouldn't allow Castiel to see him like this.

"I know the month, but I wasn't sure which day it is," Castiel pants, presenting the bundle of pages to Sam.

"It's the - right there, Cas," he says, and, even as his finger taps the square, he feels his heart drop.

"What is it?"

"There's a full moon tonight," Sam says.

"Oh," Castiel says, catching on. "Oh, Dean."   

"Yeah," Sam says.

Castiel sits down next to him. "I am sorry, Sam," he begins.

"Cas. Please don't."

Castiel nods and leans back against the wall. Dean's spine twists and ripples underneath his shirt and he claws at the ground with fingernails that are too long and dark.

"He would want us to kill him," Castiel says.

Sam scrunches the calendar in his fist. "That isn't an option," he bites out.

"I didn't mean it was. It's just what he would want."  

"Maybe, but it's not gonna happen. We keep him here, and we wait. And if he - . We just wait," Sam says.

"You'll have to watch him closely," Castiel says.

"I think we could probably just leave him, actually. I don't think he'll get through the cage."

"No, I mean - after. When he's turned back."

Sam thumps a fist into the wall. He doesn't answer, because Castiel's right. His memories of his time spent sans soul are blurry and unfocused, like they're being played underwater, but he's studied them intimately enough to know them all well. In particular he remembers Dean's short tryst as a vampire, the way he'd been resigned to his fate from the get-go. _Do it! What are you waiting for? Just kill me, c'mon!_

But they'd gotten out of that one, with the cure - _the cure_.

"I'm gonna check out the library," Sam says, standing. Castiel blinks up at him.

"I will keep watch," he says, fixing his eyes back on the cage.

Sam finds himself reluctant to leave, reluctant to leave Dean in Castiel's care. He trusts the angel, sure, but Dean is his.

In a non-creepy, brotherly way. Of course.

Maybe it wouldn't be such a bad idea to keep away from his brother for a little while. It's nothing Cas can't take care of, and Sam'd be more useful behind a book.

He climbs back upstairs and settles down in the library, stacks an armful of relevant books next to his favorite armchair.

Most of the books, he finds, are intimately detailed descriptions of how to execute anyone suffering from Dean's sort of furry little problem. Some of them are downright pornographic in their loving descriptions of silver burns and gory beheadings. Only a few hours ago he wouldn't have been bothered by them in the least - hell, he'd probably be taking notes and nodding along - but in light of recent events, he's a little sickened. All he can see is Dean, fully human and alert, looking up at him with his big eyes alight with betrayal as Sam presses a revolver to his chest.

It won't get to that. He won't let it get to that, even if he can't find a cure. There have to be other options.

_Cutt the beaste's head from his shoulder_ , the book he's reading recommends, _and gouge his eyes, else he find th path to his body_.

Sam tosses it in the general direction of the table. Not helpful.

The big grandfather clock nestled between two immense bookshelves ticks over to midnight, and Sam can feel his gut squirm. If Dean is - if he's cursed, then this is it. This is when he turns all the way. Sam makes himself pull another book from the pile, telling himself he won’t move from the spot until he hears -  

"Sam!" Castiel hollers from just down the hall, and that's it, he's out of the armchair and on his feet in an instant, electric with nervous terror.

He catches Castiel at the head of the stairs, twisting the hem of his shirt in one hand. His brow is odd and pinched and Sam, who has become somewhat of an expert at decoding Castiel's weird expressions, cannot get a read on him. It's not his _oh shit_ face, at least, so that's good.

"What's going on?" he asks, following him down the stairs into the chill, wet basement. Castiel draws him in front of the cell, and he has to take a moment for his eyes to adjust to the dark. When he's finally able to see, his jaw drops open.   

"I do not think this is typical," Castiel says.

Sam is laughing too hard to answer him.

 

Sam has to leave the room to calm down. When he comes back in, Castiel is glaring at him.

"This is not a laughing matter, Sam," he says.

"I - oh, fuck. I know, it's just - he's so - "  

Tiny, is a good adjective. Fluffy, too. He's got an itty-bitty little black nose and a curly little puff of a tail, and his face is at least three-fourths forehead, and holy shit, that's Sam's butch-ass, overcompensating big brother in a body that could probably fit inside a large shoe. The shirt and jeans he'd been wearing are discarded on the floor in a heap and the cuffs Sam'd put on him earlier are just resting on the ground, one front paw in each, way too large to fit on his skinny, chicken-bone legs. Sam would say Dean was watching them wearily except "wearily" is not an expression those guileless little eyes could ever make.  

"He's very cute," Castiel says. Which, okay, yeah, if you're into dogs that look like they've got about fifty different congenital diseases.     

Dean is making a grating, warbling noise, punctuated here and there with sharp, angry yips.

"I think he's trying to growl," Castiel says.

Sam has tears in his eyes.

"Maybe if you stopped laughing at him, he'd stop trying to break through the gate," Castiel suggests.

"Maybe if you shut up," Sam giggles.

Dean bares his teeth at them.

"Okay, Jesus, sorry, Dean. It's just, you're - _phew_."

"I think we could let him out," Castiel suggests. "He doesn't appear to be bloodthirsty. Just angry."

"Yeah, you're probably right. C'mere, little guy," Sam says, shifting closer. "No funny business, huh?"

He unlocks the cage door, and Dean waddles out on round little feet. He hardly clears Sam's ankle.

They start up the stairs.

"What are we going to do?" Castiel asks.

"I guess we'll just have to wait it out," Sam says. "You and I can research in the meantime, and Dean - shit, where'd he go?"

His brother isn't at his feet anymore, and Sam's heart skips a beat. Had he run off? Is he hiding somewhere? Is he, against all evidence, an actual threat?

"He's right there," Castiel says, pointing. Sam follows his finger, and, yep - there's his brother, sitting at the bottom of the steps, looking up at them with an expression of extreme consternation.

"His legs are too short," Sam says. "Holy shit, he can't get up the stairs."

"Shall I go - "

"Nah, hang on. I wanna take a picture of this."

Sam takes a couple satisfactory shots with his phone. _GUESS WHO_ , he types, and sends one to Charlie.

"May I retrieve your brother, now?" Castiel says. He looks irritated.

"I'll get him," Sam says quickly. He doesn't want clumsy, newly-human Cas to carry Dean up the stairs. If he tripped, or squeezed too hard - . He'd rather not think about it.

"All right, I'm gonna pick you up now," he informs his brother. "Don't be a bitch about it."

He gathers Dean up. It feels necessary to hold him with both hands, even though he could hardly be more than five pounds altogether. Under all the fur there's almost nothing to him, just a round little chest and delicate slender legs. Sam cradles the fragile little body against his chest, feeling thin bones shift under the skin. Dean's blinking nervously, wobbling back and forth like he's trying to find his balance.   

"I gotcha," Sam promises. Dean huffs wetly against his cheek.

Castiel watches them climb the stairs. When they reach the top, he reaches out a tentative hand and brushes it over Dean's flank.  

"He is very soft, Sam," Castiel says in surprise.   

"Please don't molest my werewolf brother," Sam says.

"'Werewolf' is not perhaps the most accurate term," Castiel says.

"Were-tiny-fucking-baby-dog doesn't have the same ring to it."

Castiel glares at him. "Sam, if you can't take this seriously - "

"I'm taking it seriously, believe me. It's just - look at him, Cas. I feel like I gotta buy a purse to put him in."

"Is that customary?"

"Yeah, if you're an asshole. I'm setting you down now, Dean," Sam warns his brother as they enter the library, bending over, and Dean squirms and wriggles frantically between Sam's hands, paws scrabbling against the floor.   

"Okay, woah, buddy," Sam says. "You wanna stay on my lap? Jesus Christ, Dean, you're an actual lapdog. That's incredible."

_Yip_ , says Dean.

"What should we be looking for?" Castiel asks, settling in the armchair opposite Sam's.

"Anything relevant, honestly. I don't really know what we're dealing with anymore. And we should probably figure out what the hell kind of dog he is, I guess."

"Pomeranian," Castiel supplies. "Member of the Germanic Spitz family. Its closest relatives are the Samoyed, the Alaskan - "

"Got it, Cas, thanks."

They peruse the books in silence. Whenever Dean turns his head, his rounded little ears brush against Sam's chin, and Cas was right - he is really fucking soft. Sam's tempted to bury his face into the fluffy spot at the back of Dean's neck, but he restrains himself. He'd probably get bitten.  

Cas drifts off at around two, Dean much earlier, his little head resting on Sam's shoulder. He looks peaceful, limp all over, no sign of the nightmares he often gets. Sam's loathe to wake him, but he'd like to get to bed himself, so he tries to stand as gently as he can. Dean jerks awake in his arms.

"Shh, man, it's okay," Sam says. "Just gonna go to my room."

Dean sighs at him and leans back into his shoulder.

"Yeah, I know," Sam says. "We'll fix you up, I promise."

He deposits Dean on his bed, settles himself at its head. Animal transformation. Well, it isn't the worst thing they've ever experienced. Probably not even the strangest, either. Tomorrow he'll poke through Bobby's old contacts, see if there're any friendly witches willing to lend a hand. Tonight he'll just lie back, and... yeah.

 

When he wakes up, Dean's a spot of warmth against his midsection, his small body fitted to the curve of Sam's stomach. His brother's never this touchy-feely, not when he's walking on two legs, and Sam's grateful for the closeness. He watches Dean sleep for a little while, his snub snout tucked in between his paws, eyes squeezed shut. He's wheezing a little but he looks comfortable and Sam doesn't want to move him.

They both look up when someone raps twice on the door.

"I made breakfast," Castiel says. "Also, Charlie is here."

"Fucking great," Sam mutters, grinding his palms into his sleep-salty eyes.

Dean jumps up, his wispy tail whirring back and forth at an alarming rate. He bounds to the side of the bed and peers down.

"Oh no," Sam says, snatching him up mid-leap. "You're gonna break your legs, asshole. It's like, three whole feet."

_Yip yip yip_ , Dean says.

"Yeah, yeah, calm down. We'll go see Charlie in a second."

He sets Dean on the floor and checks his cell phone. Sure enough, he's got two messages from Charlie, sent at seven AM: _when did u gget a tribble_ and then, directly after it, _im coming over_.

"Fuck," Sam says. "Fuck, fuck, fuck."

Charlie is at the table and she jumps up as soon as he enters the room.

"Hey, Charlie," he says, except Charlie's swooping down to the floor on his right.

"Oh my goodness, what a handsome little man you are," she tells Dean.

_Yip yip_ , Dean says.

"And ferocious, too," she says. "Sam, have you taken him potty yet? Can I take him potty?"

"What?" says Sam.

"Just make sure there aren't any hawks in the area," Castiel says. "Birds of prey are known to occasionally mistake small dogs for rabbits or mice."

"Yeah, yeah, gotcha," Charlie says. "Brb!" She scampers out of the kitchen, Dean under one arm.

"Bee are bee," Castiel says. "Bee are bee. Bee are - ?"

"It's an acronym, Cas," Sam says, slumping down into a chair.

"Would you like some bacon?" Castiel asks, proffering the pan.

"No," Sam says. "Just cereal. Please."

"I woke up early," Castiel says. "To heat up the stove."

Sam could swear that he was pouting. "Ugh. Fine," he says. His kind-hearted, charitable nature's gonna get him killed one day.

Cas spills a pile of soft, stringy bacon onto his plate. It looks a little like a mound of wet Fruit-Roll-Ups.

"Thanks, Cas," Sam says. Castiel beams.  

Charlie comes tromping back down the stairs. "He did such a good job!" she says, and flops into a nearby chair, Dean propped on her lap. He’s rumpled and wet, and there are leaves caught all through his thick fur.

"I am not giving him a bath," Sam says.

"Oh, he'll be fine. Cas, can I have some bacon? What's his name, by the way? If you haven't decided what to call him yet, I've got a few suggestions. How ‘bout Puffskein? Like a pygmy puff?"

"Uh, yeah, about that," Sam says. "That's Dean."

"You named your dog after your brother? Oh, shit, did something happen to him? Is this, like, a surrogate Dean? Dean Two, Electric Boogaloo?"

"No - like, literally, that's my brother. He's cursed, or something, and - ."

"Oh, Merlin," Charlie says, all but dumping Dean off her lap. "For real? I took him potty. I watched him _pee on a bush_."

Dean, rejected, squeezes underneath the legs of Sam's chair. Sam reaches down and rubs his ears absently. They're soft and pliable, like a rabbit's.

"Yeah, ever since last night," he says. "He's been - well. You know."

"Huh," she says. "You know, if I had to picture Dean as a dog, it'd be more like - I dunno, a super friendly pit bull, or something. Not... that."

"Yeah, well, took us by surprise too," Sam says. He slips Dean a piece of Cas' slimy, raw bacon.

"What are you gonna do? Can he turn back? Maybe it's just his Animagus and he's, like, doing it on purpose."

"Yeah, I don't think so," Sam says. "He was really sick most of yesterday. Plus, it's the full moon, so..."

"Aw, shit," Charlie says. "Well, at least he's docile, and not, like, an actual werewolf. Sam! Are you feeding your dog brother bacon? You can't give him that!"

"It's just meat," Sam says.

"It's table food," Charlie enunciates. "He's gonna get bad habits."

"What, like refusing to use silverware? Eating with his hands? Begging? I hate to break it to you, but - ."

"Oh, whatever. He's your dog." Charlie makes a face. "Well, okay, he's not really your dog, per se. Man, this sucks. I thought I was gonna get to play with a puppy. Plus, Dean isn't even here! Technically. Uh, no offense, Sam."

"No, I'm great," Sam says. "I'm used to being the least-favorite brother."

"That's not what I meant. It's just, Dean's, um - "

"More fun?"

"Uh. Less serious?"

"Juice," Castiel says loudly. "I made juice, at home. Please have some."

"Cas," Charlie says. "Are you trying to mediate?"

"It's very good," Castiel says. "Lots of oranges and kiwis."

"I'll have some, Cas," Sam says. "Wow. Looks, um - thick. Woah. That's enough. Thank you."

"I'm going to check out the library," Charlie says, standing. "See if I can't turn anything up in the Restricted Section."

"Hey, Charlie, no," Sam says. "You don't have to."

"I drove all the way here, dumbass," she says, grinning. "Might as well do what I can. Plus, I want Dean back. He is the cooler brother, after all."

"Yeah, okay, get out of here," Sam says, and waves her off. He's smiling to himself a little. Dean trails after her, strip of bacon flopping out of his mouth.

"You are very rude to each other," Castiel says. "I thought she was a friend. I do not understand."

"Yeah, Cas, she is, it's like - you know how Dean and I make fun of each other all the time? It's like that."

"But you are brothers."

"And Charlie's basically a sister. S'why we tease her, too. It's what families do, I guess."

"Ah. Sam?"

"Mm?"

"You have a large forehead."

"...Thanks, Cas."  

Sam discreetly dumps the rest of his bacon down the sink and joins Charlie in the library.

"Nothing yet," she says, flipping a page. His brother is sitting on the floor near her feet.

“Read that one already,” Sam says, throwing himself down on the chair opposite. “Not helpful. S’all about murder.”

“Right - we don’t wanna kill the poor baby, do we,” she says.

Dean makes a sound like a blender set on high.

“Quit making that noise,” she says, nudging him with her toe. “It’s really grating and I don’t know what it means, anyway.”

Dean makes the noise again.

“I’m gonna make a few calls,” Sam tells her, as she selects a new book to peruse. “See if I can’t dig anything up.”

Charlie curls her hand into the international ‘call me’ gesture and holds it up to her ear. “Heya, Garth? Whaddaya know about toy-breed dogs - chihuahuas, specifically?”

“Pomeranian,” Sam says.

“What?”

“He’s a pomeranian. They’re very different, actually. Chihuahuas originate from South America, while - ”   

“All right, okay, Animal Planet. Chill. I promise not to fark up his pedigree next time."

“Just trying to help,” Sam grumbles.

“Nah, it’s useful. Up until you said it I’d been reading the ‘chihuahua’ section of the werewolf transformation tome, silly me.”

They are quiet for a while. Sam habitually glances up every few minutes to check on his brother, who is leaning against Charlie’s slender ankles with his tongue drooping from his mouth. He doesn’t like having him so far away - irrational, considering the bunker’s probably the safest place in all fifty states, but it’s hard to keep his distance when his brother’s such a clumsy, fragile little thing, mostly fur and anxiety and ears that look more ornamental than anything else.

He misses his obnoxious, frenetic brother.     

 

Charlie lasts for about two hours before she’s sending the book floorwards with a grunt. Dean jumps at the noise and skitters over to Sam.

“I can’t do this any longer,” Charlie says. “Sorry, Sam, but I’m losing my mind here. Are my brains coming out my ears? ‘Cuz some of this stuff - it’s like vogon poetry, I swear to God.”

“Yeah, okay. Go take a break, play Gamecube with Cas or something,” Sam says, folding his hands around his brother’s midsection and airlifting him onto his lap.

“Oh man, you guys got a Gamecube? Where’d you score _that?_ ”

“Found it in storage. We’re pretty sure it’s not cursed.” He shoos her off. “G’won, go kick Cas’ ass at Powerstone. And don’t come back for at least a couple hours.”

“Aye aye,” she says.

Dean watches her go, turns to look at Sam with concerned, wet little eyes once she’s out of sight.

“I know, man,” Sam tells him. “Not too long now, ‘kay? We’ll figure it out.”

Dean leans against his stomach, warm and weirdly comforting, and sighs. Sam shifts his book to one hand and cards the other through the coarse fennel hair at his brother’s back, draws him in tighter. He can feel his brother’s fluttery, butterfly-winged heartbeat with the palm of his hand, as small and worrisome as the rest of him, and he’s filled with traitorous anxiety, wretched longing, Dean gone silent for not even a full day but his absence already gutting the bunker –  gutting Sam –      

Sam shakes his head, takes out his phone. Might as well try and accomplish something.

 

Garth informs him that he doesn’t know anything, though he’ll take a look. ( _“No werewolf tablets, sorry,”_ Kevin hollers in the background).

Sam takes a chance with a handful of phone numbers chosen at random from Bobby’s directory, and out of the five of them, one’s disconnected, three hang up after he mentions Bobby’s name, and the last tells him, in no kind words, to fuck off and go prank-call someone else.

Sam curses and scrunches his fist around his phone. Dean goggles into the middle distance, oblivious.  

“You’re useless,” he informs him, scowling. “Bet you’re happy you don’t have to do any of the legwork, huh?” He sighs and juggles Dean in his arms, moving to stand. Everything he’s done so far’s been goddamned useless. “C’mon, let’s go check on the kids. Make sure Cas hasn’t poisoned anyone.”   

 

He hasn’t. Charlie and Cas are sitting in his bed side-by-side in front of a blocky duct-taped television, each hunched over a controller. Something loud and colorful and incomprehensible is happening on-screen.

“Sam!” Charlie says as soon as he wanders in, her thumbs clattering away. “Did you know Cas was a genius at Soul Caliber?”

“It’s only sequences of buttons and directional input,” says Cas, brow crumpled in concentration. “Hardly a pastime that requires ‘genius’. In any case, I haven’t beaten you once.”

“But you’ve been close. That’s pretty impressive.”

Castiel shakes his head, turns to focus on Sam. “Have you found any useful information?”

On-screen, Charlie takes the opportunity to mash Cas’ character to a pulp.

“No,” Sam says sheepishly, tearing his eyes from the cartoon violence. “We can’t – there’s not much. Nothing pertinent, anyway.” 

“Hey, s’okay,” Charlie says, her voice incongruously soothing against the virtual carnage. “We’ll get there. And if the library’s not helping, I got my tablet with me.”

“Yeah. Thanks. I’ll take you up on that, maybe. I just wanna – you know.” He bounces Dean in his arms, not unlike a baby.

“Yeah, I do,” Charlie says, her mouth gone sympathetic. “Though he’s a shitton cuter like this, you gotta admit.”

Dean sneezes onto Sam’s face.

“Adorable,” Sam says.

 

They break for lunch in the kitchen, the three humans at the table, Dean on the floor with a plate of sliced deli ham. Charlie rolls her eyes but doesn’t comment.

“Maybe we’re just looking in the wrong section in general,” Sam theorizes over his peanut-butter-and-banana toast. “Maybe it’s not a werewolf thing at all.”

“You bring this up _now,”_ Charlie says, thumping the table. “Do you know how many words I’ve read about were-creatures? Like a _whole lot.”_

“It’s possible,” Cas says, sucking up a piece of leftover bacon like a noodle. “Dean’s transformation has been very irregular. With classical werewolves, the change doesn’t typically persist into the daytime. It has three nights around the full moon to change, and no more.”

“And Dean’s been, um, _changed,_ this whole time.”

“For thirteen and a half hours,” Cas says. “Not to mention his, uh. Lack of bloodthirstiness.”

They all look down at Dean, who has finished off his ham handily. He’s got bits of wet lunch meat snagged in the thick collar of hair around his neck and he’s staring hopefully up at Sam for more.

“Yeah, he’s not exactly going to town on anyone,” Charlie says.

“I’m not complaining about _that_ , believe me, but I just – he’s really not making this easy for us, is he,” Sam says.

“I doubt it’s his intent,” Cas says.

“I know, I just – .” _I miss him._ “I don’t like this.”

“Hey, we’ll find a way,” Charlie says. “Nothing too weird for the Winchesters, right?”

Yes. Right. They’ve triumphed over stranger things, newer things, Jefferson Starships and Khan worms, every breed of cursed object under the sun, and in comparison this is no threat at all.

Only – with all those threats, he’d had Dean at his side. And if being without him is like this –

No. Dean is _here._ Dean is _fine._ They’ll fix this, and then they’ll be okay again. They’ll be okay.

 

The library continues to be useless, especially so now that they’ve broadened their search beyond moon-cycle-transformations. It’s gone to black outside and Dean’s remained stubbornly small and furry the entire time.

“I’m gonna stay the night, just in case,” Charlie tells them, worrying her bottom lip with her teeth. “I brought a bag, so I’m good. We’ll just – I’ll be down the hall, okay?”

“Yeah, okay,” Sam mutters distractedly. Dean has fallen asleep at the foot of his library chair, snub chin resting on his paws, ears flat against his head. He looks for all the world like a plush toy, save the slow, regular rise and fall of his back.  

Sam collects his brother, strips down to his shorts, and gets them both settled in bed. Dean leans up against him again, head resting on his outstretched arm. It’s nice, in a way, like having a small, friendly pillow, but they don’t fit right together. He’d rather have Dean tall and broad and untouchable than this close, delicate thing, any day of the week.

 

When he wakes up the bed’s warm and full, a whole lot of skin where there wasn’t before, the wet of a mouth against his collarbone. Sam looks down and down and there’s muscled shoulder, a dimpled lower back, rough fingers curled unconscious next to his pillow –

"Dean, fuck," Sam's saying, and he's pulling his very naked brother into a crushing hug before he can think about it critically and figure, no, that is a pretty poor idea.

"Mmf," Dean says, batting him away.

"It's so good to see you," Sam says, withdrawing. "We were so worried."

"What the hell happened?" Dean asks. "Ugh. My mouth tastes like bologna. Holy shit, that sucked."

"How much do you remember?"

"I remember being really fucking short. And everything was, like, smells. And you - ." Dean breaks off, red flushing his cheeks.

Sam files this away for later. "You got turned into a dog. We think you're cursed."

"A dog? Bad-ass. What kind? Rottweiler? Bulldog?"

"Here," Sam says, passing his phone over. "We documented all of it."

Dean slides through the pictures, getting progressively redder and redder.

"What the fuck is this," he says. "This isn't - you're fucking with me. That's someone else - ."

"Yeah, right, it's the other dog we brought into the bunker. Sorry, man."

"I'm a girly dog," Dean whines. "I'm a fucking Paris Hilton dog. I'm the kind of dog people dress up in little raincoats and dresses and shit."

"You know, actually, there are probably some baby clothes, if we search - "

"Fuck you, Sam, and fuck this curse," Dean says. He huffs out a deep gush of air. "Okay. What've we got so far?"

"So far? Uh. Nothing, really. It's good that you're up and talking, actually, 'cuz earlier we were running on guesswork. You feel okay? Any, like - shit, I don't know. Phantom limbs?"

"I feel fine, it's just the raw meat thing. You got any gum? A mint?"

"Sorry," Sam says. "Cas made juice, though. It's pretty pungent."

"Yeah. No thanks. I'm gonna go brush my teeth. We can run diagnostics later, thanks."

Dean makes as if to slide off the bed - Sam, very carefully, keeps his eyes off his brother's bare ass - but realization ripples across his features and he pauses with his legs dangling over the side.

"You let me sleep on your bed," he yells. "I could've been a vicious killing machine."

Sam raises an eyebrow. "You looked at those pictures, right?"

"Yeah, and? Plenty of small things are dangerous. Like, gremlins! And fairies! Remember the fairies?"

"Dean, you had, like, no teeth. And tiny little feet. Do I need to show you again, or - ?" Sam says, pulling out his phone.

"No. I got it, dude. Just, you never know. I could've bitten you, shit. You could've gotten it, too."

"And then we could've run around in the backyard together," Sam says. "Chase a couple miniature tennis balls. It really wasn't a big deal, Dean."

"Sure, says you. What happens when we need to hunt, huh, and suddenly we're both six inches tall and yappy?"

"If it comes up, we'll deal with it," Sam says. "For now, we don't know if this thing's persistent at all. Maybe it's just a one time thing."

"When is it ever just a one time thing," Dean grumbles. "I'm gonna put some clothes on. And Sam - this happens again, you're locking me in the basement, you got it?"

"That's insane, dude."

"It's smart. We don't know what we're dealing with."

"Fine, sure," Sam says, not at all meaning it, and watches Dean's firm, taut ass stalk out the door, because he deserves at least that much. He feels guilty about it for about two seconds, up until he hears Charlie shriek _“_ oh _, no”_ out in the hallway, and then he’s totally forgotten about his potential moral bankruptcy in preparation for the oncoming tantrum _._

Dean comes tumbling back into the room with both hands clasped protectively over his groin, his face drawn in horrified mortification.  

“What,” he snarls, “is _Charlie_ doing here?”

“Shit,” Sam says.

“Yeah, _shit._ The fuck’s wrong with you? You _tryin’_ to get people killed? Not to mention I think she saw my – ”

“Is he dressed?” Charlie says from around the corner. “Are there clothes? Or maybe some bleach? For my brain?”

“Yeah, uh – we’re working on it, Charlie,” Sam says. “Just hang in there.”

Dean throws his hands up into the air, and turns to raid Sam’s closet.  “Sorry, Charlie,” he calls.

“I don’t want an apology, I want the Eternal Sunshine clinic,” she wails.

“Uh. Charlie, why don’t you go help Cas out with breakfast?” Sam suggests, as Dean wrangles himself into one of Sam’s nicer t-shirts. He’s gonna stretch out the arm-holes, isn’t he, the douchebag.  

“Yeah, I’ll – yeah,” she says. “I’ll do that. Maybe get drunk. Who knows.”

Dean glares at Sam some more, waves his hands like, _look what you’ve done now._

“Oh my _God,_ she’ll be _fine,”_ Sam says. “She _is_ fine. She’s had worse, dude.”

“ _So?_ She shouldn’t have to deal with this stuff,” Dean says, stepping into a pair of Sam’s boxers. “S’not her problem.”

“What? Look, okay, it was her choice to come. It’s not like I dragged her into this – ”

“And you couldn’t’ve sent her off? What if I’d _hurt_ her? Huh?”Dean tries to look intimidatingly disappointed, which is difficult when he’s trying to squeeze his stocky, bowlegged thighs into a pair of Sam’s jeans. Sam tries not to stare. “You know better than this, man,” Dean’s continuing. He’s started to do a sort of hoppy, squirmy dance to get the pants all the way up, and Sam is _not_ watching, he is _not –_. “We’re supposed to protect people, and, and – and she saw my _junk,_ Sam _._ Don’t you get how weird that is? She’s, like, my sister! Jesus, Sam, do you buy women’s jeans or something, ‘cuz these are just _not_ gonna zip – ”  

“Oh my God, Dean, can you _not –_ just put on a pair of fucking sweatpants instead, for _fuck’s sake – ”_

 

In the end Dean trades in the jeans for a pair of worn flannel pajama bottoms. They’re still too long for him by a few inches so he has to roll up the cuffs, and, with his sleep-glazed eyes and bristly bedhead, it makes him look endearingly young. Sam wants more than ever to snag him around the shoulders and tug him into his chest, keep him close, but instead he trails a safe distance behind him as they pad over to the kitchen.  

Cas is at the stove, tending to a pan with a spatula and a teaspoon of what _might_ be salt but could also potentially be any number of ill-advised substances, up to and including powdered soap. There are leaking egg husks smashed into the counter looking very much like someone’d crushed them in a fist. Breakfast is not promising.  

Charlie is sitting at the table, hunched over a cup of distressingly thick coffee. She looks up when they enter.

“Awesome,” she says. “Pants.” 

“Dean!” Cas says, turning a little spasmodically. His hip checks the handle of the pan and sends it at a dangerous, wobbly angle, and he doesn’t seem to notice. “Charlie told me you’d changed back. I’m glad to see you’re all right.”  
“Okay, okay,” Dean says, knocking the pan to rights with a casual swipe of his arm. “That’s enough, ladies. I’m fine. Please, someone tell me there’s more coffee left.”     

There is. Cas made enough coffee for a small army, and he’s happy to fix a mug for Dean. He’s gotten better at this particular morning ritual, at least, especially since he quit trying to add cream and sugar into the machine.

“Thanks, Cas,” Dean says, and sprawls into his seat at the table, coffee in hand. He gives Sam’s shoulder a brotherly bump in passing, and it’s only meant to be friendly, but it still sends fissures of static up and down his spine.  

Sam can’t stop _looking_ at him, worn and creased-over as he is in the daylight, chin rough with stubble, shoulders loose with sleep and home. He looks comfortable. He looks _good._ And Sam fucking loves him. 

“All right, what’ve we got,” Dean says.

“Uh,” says Charlie. “Well. About that.”

“Yeah, figured as much,” Dean says, without an ounce of bitterness. “You can’t function without me.”

“Right. I’m sure you would’ve been a _huge_ help with the research,” Sam says.

“Aw. Admit it, bitch, you missed me,” Dean says, flashing a brilliant grin, and Sam finds himself so taken aback by the playful light in his eyes that he nods dumbly.

“I – yeah,” he blurts, before his brain can catch up with his mouth, and he winces. It’s far too intimate a truth to share at the table with Charlie and Cas looking on as they are. Probably would be too intimate, still, if it was only him and Dean in an empty room. Or even just him. And as it is, Charlie’s looking at him like – like she’s piecing through a puzzle.

Dean mows right on through. “You serious, though? _Nothing?”_

“You aren’t a werewolf,” Cas says. “We think. Maybe.”

“Oh. Great. That’s real reassuring.”

“We were kinda banking on _you_ remembering something,” Charlie says, eyes still intent on Sam.

Sam clears his throat. “Uh, yeah, right. Like, um. Weird smells, noises – ”   

“Dude, I ain’t some civvie witness. I know the drill.”

“Okay, just, is there anything at all – ”

“Oh,” Dean says, slamming his mug on the table. “Well, fuck me.”

“Uh,” Sam says.  

“I know _exactly_ what happened. You remember that case we handled up in Massachusetts, like two weeks ago?”

“What?” Sam says, definitely not thinking about fucking Dean.

“Oh, c’mon – the one with the kelpie, man. You wouldn’t stop bitching about your wet socks. Don’t tell me you forgot.”

“No, yeah, I – yeah,” Sam says, wrangling his thoughts back onto the topic at hand. “I know what you mean.” He does, now that he’s thinking rationally. His boots still smell like pond water. That case _sucked._

 “Okay, well – when we were interviewing witnesses, I met this old lady with a whole bunch of, like, these shitty, froofy dogs – ”

“You _are_ one of those shitty, froofy dogs,” Charlie says.

“Not by choice, all right? It doesn’t count.”

“So let me guess,” Sam says. “You made fun of them. Right?”

“I couldn’t help it! They shed all over my fed suit and they were barking, and barking, and _barking –_ ” 

“Oh, well then, in _that_ case. Clearly it’s not your fault.”

“Like you would’ve done any different.”

“Uh, yeah? I would? I know better than to fuck around in New England, dude. ‘Specially Massachusetts. _”_

“Okay, whatever, mister high-and-mighty.”

“Which one of us is cursed to be a Paris Hilton dog again? Because last time I checked – ”  

“Look! I made more coffee!” Cas says, shoving the coffee pot underneath Sam’s nose with both hands. “So much coffee!”

He’s running interference, again, Sam realizes, this time between him and his brother, because they’re too busy sniping at each other to actually get any work done. He sighs, reevaluates, pulls back.

“Yeah. Cas is right,” he says. “Look – let’s just get you fixed, okay?”

“But – wait, what do you mean, Cas is right – ?”

“He – it doesn’t matter, just – look, okay, we think we know the source of the curse, right? Let’s look into that. Do you remember her address?”

“S’in my journal,” Dean grumbles, eyeing Cas like he’s done something particularly underhanded.

“Great. Awesome. Go grab that, all right?” Sam says.

 

Dean calls him into the main room just as Cas is approaching him with the pan of goopy eggs. He stammers an apology and bolts before he’s forced into accepting a plate.

Dean’s frowning down at his ratty notebook. “Name’s Anna Green,” he says, without further introduction. “S’about two day’s drive, if we go slow.”

“Make it three, then,” Sam says, nodding over at Charlie and Cas.

“ _Sam – ”_

“We can’t just leave‘em here, Dean.”

“Yeah? Says _who? ‘_ Cuz, way I’m looking at it, I wanna get this shit settled soon as possible, and we don’t need the Wonder Twins tagging along.”

“Okay, fine. Sure. You go ahead and tell ‘em. Make Charlie pack up. Tell Cas you don’t want him hunting with us anymore.” 

“Maybe I _will,”_ Dean says, and stomps off.

 

Dean’s about as successful as Sam expected him to be, and by ten their miniature caravan’s rolling down the highway towards Massachusetts, Sam and Dean taking point in the Impala, Charlie in the middle in a chunky two-door sedan that’s almost assuredly stolen, and Cas bringing up the rear in his Pimpmobile. They make an odd parade, Dean dodging in and out of the traffic with Charlie’s little car stuck to his bumper, Cas stopping and starting and stopping again a safe number of yards behind, all of them oblivious to the confines of the speed limit. It’d be more economical to drive all together, save on gas and time both, but Cas wanted to practice his driving and Charlie doesn’t like being a passenger, so they sort of naturally fell into this configuration as soon as they left the bunker. Besides, this is how it’s meant to be: Dean behind the wheel, Sam manning shotgun, AC/DC pumping out of the speakers – and Sam doesn’t even _like_ AC/DC, but if it means he can sit next to his brother in this car, soak up the companionable silence between the two of them, it’s worth it. Driving like this, Dean’s relaxed in a way he isn’t around strangers, around people who aren’t Sam, confident in his control over the car, the fidelity of the open road, the promise of _after_ woven into the horizon. It’s a cloudless, bright day, perfect for driving and perfect for Dean, his hair gone wheat-gold in the glare off the windowshield, eyes glinting hard green.

“Dude,” Dean gripes, catching Sam’s gaze out of the corner of his eye. “Quit staring.”

“Sorry! Sorry, I didn’t – it’s just, I’m glad you’re back, man.”

“Same here,” Dean says. “I mean, not that – I don’t remember any of it, but I still, you know. I like being human.”

“Oh, yeah?” Sam snorts.

“Fuck off,” Dean says, but it’s amicable.

It’s no different than every other meaningless road-trip conversation they’ve ever had, echoes on echoes on echoes all sponged into the upholstery, a thousand _bitch_ es and _jerk_ s lost under the space beneath the seats, _shotgun shuts his cakehole_ wrapped like rosary beads around the stick, petty music-related arguments jangling around in the ventilation – and yet.

It feels like they’re balanced on a precipice. Something has changed, and Sam’s not entirely sure what, or why, just that it’s _different_. Everything’s where it ought to be.

Well, mostly. He’d thought he’d accepted his misplaced lust for his older brother would forever go unrequited, but apparently something’s sprung a leak, because all his hope and need and longing’s come back with a vengeance and he _can’t tamp it back down._ It’s a fucking pain in the ass. Every time he glances over to the left, his heart does an angsty little wriggle. It’s torturous, and stupid, and also _dangerous,_ because he can’t let anything distract him from the job. Even incestuous gay romance.

Only, his brain’s forgotten that. Other things his brain’s forgotten include a) that Dean is very straight, b) not too keen on long-term relationships, though he would probably c) like to start a family someday, which Sam can’t at all help with, given that he lacks the necessary parts. Also _they’re brothers._      

It sucks. A lot. But he can deal, he can – he’s smothered his impulsive, incendiary thoughts for years, and he’s going to keep on trucking.  

 

They make it as far as mid-Missouri before Charlie persuades them to take a pit stop. They pull out at a little picnic spot and, in between bites of the dry cucumber sandwiches Cas’d packed, they bitch at each other under the weak shade of several tall, greying trees. It’s swampy and congested and the sandwich bread is stale, but Sam’s content to slouch next to his brother on a mossy, spongy old bench and watch Charlie try to teach Cas hand-clapping games.

Dean is not.

“Used to drive for _days,”_ he grumbles. “Forty-eight hours in a car with you stinkin’ up the back seat and Dad driving and I never complained, not _once – ”_

“Okay, first of all,” Sam says, “that never happened. The longest we’ve driven straight is, like, _maybe_ twenty hours. Maybe. Second of all, you totally complained all the time.”

“Yeah, ‘cuz Dad,” Dean says, and stops, purses his lips.

“’Cuz Dad what?” Sam says.

“Well, I mean. Sometimes he would – forget. You know? ‘Specially when we were little. You were a kid, and he – . He woulda kept on driving for hours, if I didn’t remind him about – feeding you, or your diapers, or whatever. So I had to bug him, sometimes. It wasn’t a big deal.”

And Sam doesn’t remember this. He doesn’t – or he remembers it wrong, anyway, which is worse, because he _knows_ his brother and he _knows_ Dean’s not a complainer, not ever, and all those times he’d told their Dad to quit for the night, of course he hadn’t done it for himself –

“Yeah it is,” Sam says. “It really – Jesus, Dean. That isn’t – . Jesus.” There are tears pricking at his sinuses but he’s not going to let them fall, he can’t, or Dean’ll just close off even more. Goddammit. Fucking – _Dean._ Fucking stupid selfless brother.

_I am alive because of you,_ he realizes with acute, stinging clarity. _I survived my childhood because you were there._ And fucking _John Winchester – ._

He wants to punch something. Specifically, their father.  

A hand drops onto his arm.

“Sam,” Dean says, and he doesn’t sound much of anything but tired. “Just – don’t, all right?”

In the far distance, past a cove of murky green hills, there’s the foggy suggestion of a shambling structure, leant back on its hindquarters like it’s been told to heel. Sam doesn’t look away from it but he knows on instinct Dean’s got every inch of his body focused on Sam, Sammy, the kid he’s pulled from the fire a hundred thousand times.  

Sam survived. Past tense. 

“Goddammit,” he says, and then, “fine.”

He can only deal with what is. And this – Charlie’s pleased, flutelike laughter and Cas’ rumbly response, Dean’s thigh pressed warm into his – this isn’t difficult. He’d like to freeze them right here, right at this moment, so that whatever oblong change he’s sensed coming will pass right over them, neat as a picture frame, the Winchester boys wrapped up in each other on a bench, Charlie and Castiel clapping in the grass, all of it framed with soft grey slivers of hill. And – stay.

But time is time, and Dean’s anxious to get moving, so they start on into the growing dark, cut through Illinois like a throat. Dean won’t stop until Bloomington, Indiana, and by his reckoning that’s one hell of a compromise because he’s chomping at the bit to leave it in their dust and tackle Ohio. Sam would let him but Charlie and Cas are wilting and everyone’s starving, so instead they swoop off the freeway and stop at a homey steakhouse.

They’re road-worn and ornery, greasy with inactivity, and the waitresses eye them with apprehension as they file in. Sam feels even more disgusting than he usually does after trips like this, dirty and sticky and bloated, and when he catches his own reflection in the mirror he realizes his hair’s gone lank in the front and all matted up in the back.

Dean, though, Dean’s gifted with miraculous genes that somehow leave him _more_ attractive after a long road trip, his rumpled hair and clothes rakish and daring, his stiff walk indicative of a hard, lonely past, the kind that makes girls want to pet his cheeks and coo. His day-old scruff draws more attention to his full lips and gives sharp definition to his jaw, whereas Sam’s just makes him look sorta vagabondish and threatening.

They let Dean take point and do most of the talking with their waitress, since he’s the only one in the group that doesn’t resemble a loosed mental patient. They perk up once the food’s arrived, but soon Cas has his head buried in the crook of his elbow and Charlie looks like she’s spooning soup into her mouth on rote memory alone.

“How ‘bout we get a room for the night,” Sam suggests. Dean shoots him a dirty look that is promptly ignored.

“That’d be… nice,” Cas says into the sleeve of his coat.

“Please,” Charlie says.

Dean looks between the four of them, pained. “So, what – we gonna get one room, and slum it?”

“No way,” Charlie says. “I am _not_ sharing a room with you. No offense.”

“Charlie – we don’t really have the cash – ”  

“Hey – don’t worry about it. Rooms are on me, bitches!” she says, waving a credit card. “Well, actually, they’re on the National Organization for Marriage. But very technically speaking, I’m paying for it.”

“Thanks, Charlie,” Sam says.   

“My pleasure. The more cash I can siphon off hate-groups, the better.”

 

They settle for a large, corporate-looking hotel a little ways off the highway. The waiting room’s damn nice, polished floors and fancy potted plants and wallpaper without any mysterious stains, and Sam can tell already that they’re in for a far more comfortable stay than usual. Maybe the bedding will even be clean. Imagine.  

“Sammy,” Dean whispers, with gleeful little-boy enthusiasm, and points. “Look. They got a _chandelier.”_    

It’s less than impressive – only five dinky arms, and probably made out of plastic – but he smiles because Dean’s smiling, too. The lobby’s not very crowded but he feels, suddenly, anonymous, like the whole room’s sunk into a liminal state and he’s tipping one way – this is it, this is the cliff – and it’s so quiet and bright he thinks, maybe, if he were to tug his brother close, if he were to pull their mouths together, this space would forgive him – 

“Damn, check out the receptionist,” Charlie says, elbowing him. “That is one _fine_ lady.”

“Hell, yeah, she is,” Dean says, his smile going salacious. “Now _there’s_ a woman. Maybe I’ll ask for a tour.” 

The room teeters back. The cliff recedes. Sam is an idiot.

“I saw her first, I get dibs. Plus, I’m the one with the Multi Pass here, mister Korben Dallas,” Charlie says, shaking her credit card at him, “ – so _I’m_ gonna go get our rooms. And a phone number.”  

Dean looks like he’s about to say something scathing and potentially hurtful, so Sam jumps in over him. “Hey, Charlie,” he says, “Get me and Dean a double, okay? Just in case – . Just in case.”

“Will do, captain,” Charlie says, and struts over to the counter, fluffing her hair on the way. Sam mentally wishes her good luck – not because he’d rather it be her than Dean, of _course_ not. She’s his friend, and he wants to see her happy.

Dean leans in, eyes gone wide and worried, pupils pulled to dark pinpricks. “Sam, I don’t – you think I might – ? Change?” he says.

_No._ “I dunno, Dean,” Sam says. “Maybe. I don’t wanna take that chance.”

“Yeah, me neither,” Dean says. “Thanks, man, for – you know. Sticking this out.”

“Yeah,” Sam says. “Anytime.”


	2. the one with the porn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> here there be porn

They get three rooms that are reasonably close together, and Charlie gets a phone number, plus an added note underneath it – _I get off at midnight_ – and a doodle of a heart.

“Looks like I’m gonna be getting off at midnight, too,” Charlie says smugly, and Dean tries to shove her into the wall and cover his ears at the same time.    

The room is pretty damn nice; plush crimson comforters and the kind of carpet you aren’t afraid to put bare feet on, special oatmeal soaps in the bathroom, a fat armchair in the corner. There are about two dozen pillows piled onto each bed, and the television is an enormous flat screen, and Sam can tell by the way Dean’s eyeing the room that he’s sizing up exactly how much he can steal without arousing too much immediate suspicion. The television will probably have to stay, but the pillows – those are fair game.

Dean strips down to a t-shirt and boxers and collapses into the pile of pillows on the bed nearest to the door. “ _Damn_ ,” he says, eyes shut in bliss. “Fuck, Sam – you gotta try out these _beds_.”

Dean’s clearly ascended to some kind of pillow nirvana, limp bliss in every heavy limb, and so he’s got no clue that Sam’s staring at him like a starving man, no clue how he _looks_ with his shirt rucked up over his belly, his bowed legs sprawled out in a lazy wide n like he’s waiting for someone to get between them, fuck him hard and fast and desperate the way he needs it –    

“’M gonna take a shower,” Sam says, and quarantines himself in the bathroom for half an hour.

When he finally comes out, Dean is irate. “Je _sus,_ the hell took you so long?” he says, shoulder-checking his way into the bathroom. “You jerkin’ off in there? Better not’ve clogged up the drain, Sammy.”

“Ew – _no_ – ” Sam says, and it’s the truth; he hadn’t touched his dick at all. He’d forced himself under the icy water, cold enough to burn, until it’d deflated, and then he’d washed himself as usual and tried _really hard_ not to think about the slice of tanned skin below Dean’s bellybutton, the light line of hair running down past the elastic of his boxers – .

It took a while to calm down, is all.

The shower turns on in the other room, and Sam, clad in a pair of worn-out flannel pajama bottoms, slithers into the bed and tries to drown himself underneath all the damn pillows. He hates that this is happening. He _hates_ it. Maybe he should’ve let Dean get his own room, let him pick up a girl or two, because this whole dramatic lovesick thing _cannot_ go on.

The shower goes off. The door opens. Sam stares straight up at the ceiling.

“Gotta say,” Dean announces. “The water pressure here? Not as good as at the bunker.”

“Ngh,” Sam says despairingly, a little muffled by all the pillows.

There’s the heavy _thwap_ of a wet towel hitting the ground, scratch of a zipper and soft rustling clothes, and then silence. Sam holds his breath.

Dean’s voice comes from right above his head. “Sam,” he says, “the _hell_ ’re you doing?”

Sam sits up. A couple pillows bounce onto the floor. “S’comfy,” he says lamely.

“Whatever, weirdo,” Dean says, and he’s _right there,_ torso bare and well-tanned and patterned with silvery swaths of familiar scars, gooseflesh raised along his chest. They’re a matching set, the two of them, battered to hell and back but still _alive_ despite it all – demons and angels and afterlives and trials and absent fathers – and they’ll be alive through the next day, and the next. They can survive anything. _Anything._

“Dean,” he says. “Hey. Thanks, man.”

“Uh,” Dean says, looking bemused. “You’re… welcome? The hell’re you talking about?”

“For – everything, man, I – . You took care of me, you know? You kept me alive.”

Dean snorts. “Didn’t think that mattered much to you.”

“’Course it does. I mean, I probably don’t know half the shit you did for me, but I appreciate it, okay?”

“Oh, yeah? ‘Cuz the way you’re trying to throw yourself under the bus these days, seems like none of what I did really matters to you much.”

“That’s not true – ”

“Yeah, sure, Sam. Whatever. Look – I’m tired, all right? ‘M going to bed – ”  

Sam grabs his wrist. “Dean! Don’t write this off, c’mon. I’m serious.”

“Yeah, and that’s the freaky part,” Dean says, trying to tug his arm free with little luck. “You don’t _see_ this shit. You can’t tell me you wanna thank me and then go out and try to – to kill yourself, Sam, you were gonna _die_. That’s – that’s great, Sam, really. You sure know how to thank a guy.”

“Jesus, I wasn’t doing the trials to _spite_ you – I wasn’t going into it, like, hey! I can’t wait to abandon my brother!”

“Endgame was still the same. You’d be gone, and I’d – would you _let go_ of my fucking _wrist,_ Sam, fucking _Christ –_!”

“No. Not until we talk about this. You didn’t deserve that – hell, _I_ didn’t deserve it, either – but I thought it was right, so I had to go through with it. You taught me that: you have to do the right thing no matter what, even when it hurts. Especially when it hurts.”    

“That’s _my_ job, not yours. I shoulda been doing those trials – ”

“So, then, what, _you’d_ be dead?” Sam snaps. He’s aware that he’s grinding the bones of Dean’s wrists together with the strength of his grip, but he’s too irritated at him to lessen up.

“You could deal,” Dean says. “All right? You’ve always done fine without me.”

“Why the _fuck_ would you – you remember that time you were gone for four months? That ring a bell? I went off the rails, you know that. And, I mean, fuck, if you need something contemporary – you were a dog for, like, twenty four hours, and I was already getting antsy, and when you came back, it was such a relief – and you were _right there_ the whole time – .”

Dean, the bastard, is _laughing._ Sam’s all set to be righteously indignant – he’s baring his soul, here, and it’s _so_ like his brother to trivialize this shit when he can’t deal with it – except then he thinks about it a little bit and, yeah, it’s more than a little absurd. He coughs out an incredulous laugh and Dean looks up, grinning.

“We’re fucked up, aren’t we,” he says, shaking his head.

“Like you wouldn’t believe,” Sam says. “Dean – ”

“Yeah, yeah, I know, _hazard of the job, shitty upbringing._ Save it, Doctor Phil.”

“No, that’s not – I’m serious, we – .” He scrabbles to find the words he needs to describe how empty the bunker’d felt without him, how he’d felt incomplete himself and _lonely,_ fuck, so lonely, even with Cas and Charlie keeping him company, because there’s this space he’s got in him where Dean _has_ to be – . “I don’t wanna leave you,” he tries, and it’s wholly inadequate.

“Better not,” Dean says gruffly.

“No – I mean, _yes,_ but – I mean, I _can’t_ leave you, ‘cuz – ”

Fuck it. He’s gonna take a swan dive right the fuck off this cliff.

He yanks Dean down and lunges up at the same time, face-first. The whole thing’s uncoordinated and poorly executed, and at first he accidentally smashes his lips into Dean’s philtrum and gets a mouthful of stubble, but then he readjusts and finds his brother’s lips and they’re just as soft as he’d imagined they’d be, maybe more. 

Only. Dean isn’t moving – at _all,_ still as a statue where Sam’d tugged him – and Sam can’t, he can’t force him into this, he _won’t,_ and he doesn’t want to but he opens his eyes and pulls away from Dean’s motionless lips.

He’d fucked up. He’d fucked up so bad. This whole stupid _thing_ he thought he’d felt, this change or choice or whatever the fuck, it’d all been in his head, and now he’s done the unforgivable. He’s babbling _sorry_ s and _didn’t mean to_ s and Dean’s impassive, face a blank mask save for his eyes, which are intense in their examination of Sam’s face.

“You promise?” Dean says, cutting right through Sam’s desperate apologies.

“What – ?”

“You ain’t gonna take off? No more of this – self sacrifice bullshit?”

“Yeah – ? I promise, I do, but what – ”

“Okay,” Dean says, and his face has come impossibly close and Sam can see every familiar freckle and wrinkle, and then his lips are – but that doesn’t make _sense,_ because Dean hadn’t _wanted_ this – but they’re kissing and for real this time, give and take on both sides, gentle and tentative still, sweet, like they’re afraid to upset the other.

But Sam wants – all sorts of things, really, and he knows his brother isn’t particularly gun-shy, so he goes ahead and sucks Dean’s lower lip into his mouth and licks at it, lavishes it with attention, and when he pulls back Dean’s mouth is wet with spit and swollen red. He can’t remember when it’d happened but he’d let go of his wrist some time ago and instead brought his hand up to cup Dean’s face, and in turn Dean’s fingers are tangled in his long hair, and it’s like he’s filled with light.

There’d only ever really been one choice. One way forward.

“ _Dean,”_ he says.   

“You stay here,” Dean says. “You stay here with me, you hear – you _hear – ?”_

“Yeah, Dean, I swear, I,” he says, and though he’d say probably anything to get his brother’s lips back on his he does, really, mean it.

Dean kisses his forehead, instead, the place between his eyebrows where it’s gone all sweaty.

“I don’t want to die,” Sam says slowly, and it’s impossible to tell which one of them leant in first but they’re kissing and kissing and kissing and they might as well be occupying the same space for how close they’ve become, Sam’s hands seeking out the warm, cratered skin of Dean’s back, the width of his biceps. It’s wet and messy and hungry, like they’re trying to devour each other, swallow everything they can reach, and Sam wouldn’t mind feasting like this forever.

He’s so lost to the kiss that he only belatedly realizes that Dean’s been hunched over the bed the entire time, his neck at an awkward angle as to allow their faces to meet, and he feels a little sting of guilt at his neglect. He tugs him forward to try and urge him up on the bed and Dean follows, hoists one leg up and over and sits himself right in Sam’s lap, the two of them slotting together like this is the way it was always meant to be. Dean’s halfway to hard, erection nudging against Sam’s stomach, and it’s got him dizzy with need, starving to touch but still unsure what’s allowed, so he slides an experimental hand up the inside of Dean’s thigh and kneads at the muscle he finds there.   

“Yeah, touch me, c’mon,” Dean says, lips hot and wet against his ear, and Sam groans, runs his hand up the thick rise of  Dean’s cock through the fabric of his flannel bottoms. It grows against his palm, twitching. Dean bucks himself forward impatiently for _more, harder, closer_ but Sam ignores him, rubs him slow through his pants, bites and sucks at his neck. He wants to mark him all over, every place anyone else has ever touched, wants to bruise him clean. He wants to learn where he’s calloused and hard and where he’s soft and vulnerable and kiss him there, make him new again. 

His other hand slips downward, finds the rise of Dean’s ass, and he freezes – is that too much? is that – ? but then Dean breathes a little gaspy _ah_ into his mouth, tilts himself upward into Sam’s palm, and his gut twinges so hard and so sharp he shakes with it, groans a little himself.

He takes his hand off Dean’s cock and brings it around (“ _hey,”_ Dean says, affronted), and shoves them both down the back of Dean’s pants to grab and tug at the soft flesh of his ass.

“F’r fuck’s – take ‘em _off,”_ Dean complains, and with some careful maneuvering they get first his and then Sam’s pants onto the floor, and they’re both very, very naked, thighs touching skin on skin, Dean’s softer than he ever could’ve expected. Dean’s got a nice cock, too – _handsome,_ if that’s an adjective one could use, red-flushed and proud. Sam reaches forward to stroke it experimentally and realizes Dean’s attention is firmly fixed elsewhere.   

“Jesus Christ,” Dean says, staring. “Where the _fuck_ you been packing that thing?”

“Um,” says Sam.

“How do you _walk_? Scratch that – how the fuck d’you even get your pants on? Fuckin’ baseball bat shoved in there – ”

“It’s not – okay, it isn’t _that_ big – ”

“ _Not that –_ you ever actually looked at it? Dude, it’s like, the size of my forearm.”

“ _No_ it is _not –_ just shut up, you moron, c’mere,” Sam says, and drags him back into a kiss. Dean’s just being an asshole, as usual, because sure, it’s a bit thicker around than the average dick, and a couple inches longer – okay, _several –_

All right, so Dean’s got a point. It’s just, there are more important things to be done, like getting his hand around as much of the two of them as he can and jacking them, slowly, together. Also very important: biting bruises into Dean’s neck as he gasps and wriggles and begs Sam for more.   

“I wanna – please, Dean, let me fuck you,” Sam chokes, and Dean whimpers a little.

“Fine, all right, just – go slow, man, you gotta – ”

“Of course – I won’t – we got lube?”

“Vaseline, Vaseline on the – nightstand _,_ Sam, yeah.”

Why there’s Vaseline on the nightstand, Sam doesn’t know, but he also doesn’t care, because his brother’s naked and panting and his higher brain functioning has long since been shut down. “Can I – ?” he asks.

“Yeah, go ahead, bitch.”

Sam coats two of his fingers and brings them around to Dean’s back, thumbs down until he’s at the cleft of his ass and pets, uncertainly, between. There’s silky skin and then, hot and twitching underneath his fingertips, the upper edge of his asshole. Dean jerks and gives a little gasp, tries to cover it up with a cough, fails miserably.

“Yeah?” Sam says, hoarse, and Dean nods.

His finger sinks in smooth as butter, right down to the last knuckle, and they both inhale deep and startled at the same time, Dean’s eyes blown huge. Sam can feel – _everything,_ the flex and pull of his brother’s skin, and _God_ but he wishes he could see it too, see him stretch and spread around his finger, watch every little convulsion, every tremor, maybe chase them with his tongue.

“Move,” Dean says, biting into his lip, and Sam has to oblige him, has to feel out his body with his fingers, learn the warm, wet clench of his insides. He gets his other hand slicked, too, teases at the tense ring of his opening while his first finger’s still buried deep, and Dean squeaks and grips at his forearm.

“You good?” Sam asks, and Dean nods, relaxes his hold. Lets Sam ease in a second finger.

He’s crushingly tight inside. Sam tries to coax him into relaxing, keeps his hand still and just strokes, ever so gently, at Dean’s soft inner walls. Dean seems to like that, his eyes fluttering shut and his breath catching in his throat. He likes it even better when Sam, emboldened, starts to slide his fingers in and out, nudging him apart bit by bit, carving out centimeters of space. He’s going to be _in_ that, he thinks, gonna wrap the two of them together so close they’ll never come apart again, and he goes faster, tries to separate his fingers, test out the give of his rim. He takes a third finger easy, doesn’t startle at all – actually starts pushing back, trying to get more, and Sam has to remove his second hand to hold him steady.  

“Sam – _let me,_ please,” Dean says, tries to ride Sam’s hand like a whore, but Sam won’t. He wants to do this at his own pace, and Dean’s breakneck method – as hot as it is – isn’t it.

Four fingers and Dean gasps, stutters out a shocked _Sammy._ Sam can curl them a little bit, feel Dean bulge out around him as he does, and it’s an intoxicating, powerful thing to have Dean hooked like that, to still him in the most intimate way he can imagine. Dean shudders and whines and keeps attempting to shove back, and finally Sam gives in and lets go of his thigh so he can move with abandon.

“Yeah – fuck, Sam – ”

“Bet you could take my whole hand,” Sam says, and even as Dean’s shaking his head _no, no, no_ he’s squirming back further, rocking Sam’s forearm with the strength of his thrusts. Sam won’t attempt it, but the thought of Dean struggling to take in the bulge of his thumb, closing finally around his wrist –  

“Sam, I’m good, I’m – hey, pull out, let me – ”

“You okay?” Sam says, stilling.

“I’m _great,_ Sam – wanna get you in me now, c’mon. Fuck me, Sammy, show me what you got – ”

“Yes – shit, yeah, please.”

He withdraws and wipes his sticky hands on the bedspread, sends a silent apology to the hotel staff. He doesn’t like being so inconsiderate, usually, but Dean’s hovering over him, one hand on Sam’s chest and the other steadying his cock to bring it up to where he’s wet and slicked open and Sam’s not terribly inclined to care right now.

Dean circles the head around once, twice, rubs it against his thighs, and Sam’s halfway to jerking upward and burying himself on his own when finally Dean presses them together and forces himself downward.

Sam gets the tiniest taste of warm wet pressure lapping at the very head of his cock, and then it pops right back out.

“Sonuva _bitch,_ ” Dean says.

“It’s okay if you, um. Don’t want to,” Sam says, even though at this point he’d just about be willing to sell his soul if it meant he’d get into Dean’s ass.

“Fuck that,” Dean says, and pushes steadily, impossible squeeze accepting him in so cautiously, until Dean hits some kind of turning point and the whole head’s swallowed up all at once, his entrance banded tight just below the crown.

“Dean _,”_ Sam gasps. He’s tight, so tight, soft and slick around his cock, and Sam’s never been happier to not be a teenager, because sixteen-year-old him probably would’ve blown his load right then and there.

“Fuck,” Dean’s saying. “ _Fuck._ Motherfucker. Fuckin’ – _huge,_ Sammy, gonna, gonna bust me open – ”

“Shit – Dean, I don’t wanna – maybe you should – ”

“No. No. I’m gonna – I’m gonna. Take fucking all of you – fuck, _Sam –_ ”

All Sam can see is the high blush of color on Dean’s cheeks, the worried, studious wrinkle in his brow, every twitch and pull of his lips as he reacts to the slow breach of Sam’s cock, until he’s seated fully on Sam’s hips and his breath’s coming in short, hurt bursts.

“ _Dean,”_ Sam says, and he’s panting, too, all of that living pressure around him, tight glossy heat, he’s _in_ him, he’s _inside_ his brother. “Dean, oh my God. Oh my God, you – .”

“Yeah,” Dean grunts, slumping just a little. “Just – gimme a minute, just – . Don’t move.”

“You’re so – fuck,” he babbles. “So tight. _Dean._ Feel so good.”

“That so?” Dean pants. “Okay, sasquatch, _fuck –_ I’m gonna move now, so sit tight.”

He raises himself up hardly at all, slides a single slow inch and then down again, tentative and nervous and fucking perfect, even though he’s barely moving, even though his hands are shaking where they’ve fallen on Sam’s chest. He tries a little more and he’s going so slow Sam can feelthe clenching, sucking progress of his rim as it’s worked up his cock, the pull in as he slides down, his face startled and open, brow scrunched. He is gorgeous in his concentration and the bead of molten heat that sweeps over Sam’s body is an inferno, a consumption. He isn’t going to survive this.

“Sorry, sorry,” Dean is saying. “I’ll do better, I can do – you’re just – fuckin’ _big,_ man, I can’t – ”

“S’okay,” Sam tells him, “don’t – ah – . Don’t hurry – if you don’t – ”

Dean doesn’t listen, of course, the stubborn idiot, and starts to move faster instead, using his thighs and pelvis to buoy him up and over in careful, rough heaves, timid lurch halfway upward and back down again, keeping most of Sam in him at once so that he’s keeping himself open and ready, so he doesn’t have to plow himself back apart every time he sits. Sam’s starving for more, strung bow-tight and desperate with need, but he isn’t going to move. He _won’t._   

He startles at the brush of a wet finger against the base of his cock, across the place where they’re joined.

“More lube,” Dean explains, breathless and moving again, and the slip-slide of their skin together is easier, simpler, a steady glide. Dean’s found his rhythm, now, and he’s bouncing on Sam’s cock with purpose, panting out small breathy moans every time he bottoms out, and Sam’s burning up with the need to hear more, force sound and need out of Dean.

“Please – Dean – I need to move, I gotta – ” Sam says, and Dean whimpers, drives down harder.

“ _Yes_ ,” he says, “yeah, Sammy, _please,”_ and that’s all the permission Sam needs to grab his brother’s hips and fuck into him from below, press upward in a way that makes Dean’s thighs go shuddery-tense, makes him cry out and jam his body down hard.

“Right there – ” he says. “Fuck, Sam, just like that, fuck me – _Sammy – ”_   

They’re both dripping with sweat and Sam’s hands are slipping but he clings on anyway, tries to keep on hitting that angle, keep him squirming and gasping and biting out praise in his familiar, rough voice, _fuck, Sam, yeah – that’s it, don’t stop –_. And it’s strange, almost, to hear him spit all these desperate, needy words, because Sam, who has shared rooms with and walked in on Dean for years, knows from experience that he’s never quite this loud with a girl. He gives the odd grunt, a few anonymous endearments, but these sounds he’s making now, ragged, smoky pleas, they’re all for Sam, and it’s fucking incredible. Dean’s riding him and he _loves_ it, loves taking Sam’s dick in his ass, and he’s not even trying to be quiet about it.   

“ _Dean,”_ he says, driving upward, short, perfunctory thrusts, and Dean leans himself forward to bury his face against the side of Sam’s neck, hips pumping wildly the whole time. He feels so _good_ inside, so hot and slick and tight, and Sam couldn’t ever get inside him far enough, couldn’t ever get to a point where he’d want to separate the two of them.

“I’m gonna – Sam, I’m coming, I’m gonna come, I – ”

Dean’s lashes tickle the skin of his cheek and he has to pull back a little, has to see for himself – maybe just to prove it’s real, maybe just to remember, get a tangible keepsake because who knows if there’s more, ever, maybe this is it, maybe this is it and he _needs –_ and he watches as Dean’s rose-pink mouth parts on a soundless _oh_ and his head’s tossed back, the arch of his neck feline and glimmering with sweat, raw in places from Sam’s teeth. He’s bow-backed and shivering, moving like he can’t control himself, hips grinding close and jerky, _right there, right there, yeah,_ nothing like what Sam needs except _exactly_ that, because he could watch his brother balanced on the edge like this _forever_.

“Sammy,” he chokes, says it through the clamp of his teeth, and he’s coming without a hand on him, white jettisoning out onto his stomach, his thighs, Sam’s chest _._ He’s clenching and squirming around Sam’s cock and it’s good but it’s not enough, not _enough,_ and so Sam gives up all pretense of kindness and flips them both over so that he can brace his knees on the bed and drive in hard, chase his own orgasm to completion. Dean is pliant and come-sloppy under him, sated into limpness, but he’s still trying to urge Sam on best he can, wrapping one loose leg around the dip above Sam’s ass and pulling him close, riding out every thrust with little circles of his hips. 

“C’mon Sam, c’mon,” he says, and Sam fists the bedsheets, can feel the end building up too sudden, too soon – he wants to be inside his brother forever, he doesn’t want to leave, he doesn’t want to – but his abdomen’s coiling and coiling and he’s gone tight all over, ready tension in his thighs and back and balls.     

“Oh fuck oh fuck oh _fuck – ”_ he’s saying, hammering into his brother’s body with nearly all his weight and Dean’s just taking it, opening up so nice for him, clinging to him all over – he was _made_ for this, fucking _hell_ –

“Give it to me, Sammy, that’s it,” Dean husks, smiling his easy smile, and Sam just, he can’t hold on, not any longer. He slams in deep as he can, Dean all around him, Dean swallowing him up so sweet, and he spills and spills and spills until he’s shaking, until there are white starry bursts running across his vision and he collapses, spent.

“Oof,” Dean says. “Dude.”  

“Mm,” Sam agrees. He feels heavy and warm all over, half-melted. He just wants to – God. Stay like this. Always. Dean’s fucking – he’s _amazing._

“Sam?” he hears his brother say, somewhere far-off. “Sam, you’re sweaty and heavy and – fuck’s sake, come _on._ Don’t you fall asleep on me. _”_

Someone’s swatting at his shoulders and, right, Dean. He obligingly pulls out and rolls to his side, dragging his brother with him, their legs tangled together.

He sleeps and does not dream.


	3. the one with the conclusion

Sam wakes slow and warm and easy for probably the first time in years. Dean’s skull is nestled heavy under his chin – and, yeah, _this,_ this is what he was missing back when he’d cuddled up with dog-Dean: this expanse of wild, freckled skin, a hand curled lax and open, palm up, next to his face on the pillow. There are purple-red blotches running down his neck and shoulders where’d he’d been chewed on the night before, and Sam brings his fingertips to them with a small smile, runs his hand down the firm line of his arm.

Dean makes the transition from dead-to-the-world to half-sitting and ready to fight before Sam can blink. His hand’s clenched around nothing – space where a knife should be, he figures – and he looks woozily murderous, sneering and blinking stupidly all at once.

“Woah, hey – it’s me. It’s just Sam.”

Dean shakes his head and scowls, and awareness comes pouring back into his eyes “I knew that,” he snaps, flopping back onto his pillow. “Doesn’t kill a man to be prepared, s’all.”

Sam carefully doesn’t mention that all their weapons are currently about half a room away, so if they’d really been interrupted in their sleep, they probably wouldn’tve had much of a chance, impressive reaction time or no. Instead, he leans in and kisses him square on the mouth.

Dean makes a noise like _pleh_ and shoves him away, spitting and sputtering, and it’s like the last ten hours hadn’t happened, like they’d never fallen into bed with each other, never kissed so sweetly –. They’re both naked and sharing a bed, which doesn’t typically happen, but their lives are fucking weird, so if –

“Quit freakin’ out, I can hear it from here,” Dean says. “Got a mouthful of your stupid hair, s’all. Blegh. Watch where you’re swinging that shit.”

Sam’s shoulders slump in relief. “We’re okay, then?” he asks.

What he really means, is, was that a one-time thing? Can I kiss you, still? Are you angry? But he can’t make his mouth work around those questions, and he doesn’t think they’d be accepted, anyway.

Dean answers him by cupping his jaw and leaning in for a slow kiss. He’s even stubblier than he was the day before, and their cheeks rasp together not entirely pleasantly.

“Shut up, bitch,” he says fondly, and eases off the bed. “Gonna go take a shower.”

His walk over to the bathroom’s more of a limp than a swagger, and Sam can’t help but feel a little abashed. He hadn’t been kind, exactly, on Dean’s ass, and he’d really rather avoid hurting his brother.

But it’s _such a nice ass._       

The knock on the door’s almost drowned out by the roar of the shower, and Sam scrabbles off the bed, naked as the day he was born.

“Um, just a minute,” he calls, heart beating furiously. His pants are – over there, okay, and he puts them on and stumbles over to the door, tries not to look like he’d just had sex with his brother.

“Charlie, hey,” he says. He hasn’t got dried semen on him anywhere, does he? _Does he?_ He isn’t sure. He can’t check now.

“Hiya,” she says. “Thought we were gonna leave at oh-seven-hundred, but when you didn’t turn up in the lobby – ”

“Yeah, um – the alarm, you know, it didn’t – .” Actually, it had, and Sam distinctly remembers waking up, slapping it off, then thinking _fuck it_ and burrowing back under the covers with his brother. But that’s not something Charlie needs to know.

“Don’t worry about it. At all. There’s an _arcade_ down there, did you see? And Maia’s real good at Street Fighter – ”

“Maia?” Sam says.

“The girl from the desk – she’s _amazing,_ Sam, like you wouldn’t believe how _cool_ she is. We debated about the worthiness of Spec Ops: The Line for, like, an hour, and she likes Tekkonkinkreet and Paprika and _oh my God_ , Sam, I think I’m in _love.”_

_Same here,_ he doesn’t say, and the thought – Dean and love and _being in love –_ doesn’t hurt at all, not the way it used to, anyway, no stomach-churning guilt and worry. He doesn’t feel wrong, or sick. He feels like himself.

He beams at her. “That’s _awesome,_ Charlie. For real.” He’d like to hug her, except, dried semen. Plus, he probably smells. “How ‘bout I go shower, and then we can get going, okay?”

“Please,” she says. “The shower part, I mean. I’m in no rush. Take your time.”

And then she _wiggles her eyebrows._ Mother _fucker._

He is _so_ not mentioning this to Dean.

He _does_ take his time, thank you very much, though that has more to do with enjoying the hotel’s impressive selection of miniature fancy soaps than canoodling with his brother.

When he gets out, ruffling a towel through his wet hair, Dean throws his duffel at him and scowls. “C’mon, dickwad,” he complains.

Sam’s too busy gaping to protest the nickname. Even Dean’s customary Texan-in-New-England style of layers on layers on layers can’t disguise the angry, messy patchwork of bruises around his neck. It’d be a great opportunity for a turtleneck, only Dean thinks turtlenecks are, quote, _gay as hell,_ so he’s stuck baring their nighttime exploits for all to see.

“Uh. Sorry?” is all Sam can finally say.

Dean just rolls his eyes. “C’mon, the kids are prob’ly waiting for us. Get your shit.”

They leave with two more bags than they’d come in with, and judging by their weight, Sam can only guess that they’re stuffed with pillows. That really shouldn’t excite him as much as it does. 

Charlie and Cas are hanging out in the lobby, whispering vigorously to each other and splitting apart as soon as the brothers draw near, which is never at all a good sign. Charlie’s eyes immediately lock on to Dean’s neck, and, well, there’s that. The eyebrow thing she’d done earlier was maybe tangential – who knows, she could’ve been doing it for a whole different reason, she runs on a different set of rules than most – but the bruises wound around Dean’s neck are as obvious to her as they are the next person, and he’s positive she knows.She’s not stupid, and all the facts are adding up incest.

“How ‘bout we get going,” he says hurriedly, and runs off to the car before she can try and initiate conversation. He has a feeling he’s only postponed the discussion, though, not avoided it entirely.

Dean’s trying not to limp best as he can, and he’s doing an admirable job, but as soon as he lowers himself into the driver’s seat he makes a sour face and swears under his breath.

“You okay there, man?” Sam says. “You wanna go pick up, like, one of those donut pillows? You know, with the hole in the middle?”

“Go fuck yourself.”

“You sure? ‘Cuz if you’re hurting, I mean. Heard they’re real helpful. Pregnant ladies swear by ‘em.”

Dean nails him in the face with a pen and goes on to prove to him that he can drive _just fine_ without the assistance of a pillow.

 

Charlie makes her move in a Gas-And-Sip somewhere outside Pittsburgh while Cas and Dean are babysitting the cars outside.

“So you and Dean,” she says, sticking an enormous dome-topped cup under the blue raspberry nozzle of the station’s self-serve Icee machine.     

Sam nearly drops his coffee. “Um,” he says. “What – ?”

“You can punch me if I’m wrong, I’d deserve it, but I gotta know – are you two, like, a thing now?”

“Um. Uh. That’s not – . When you say _a thing,_ you mean – ”

“I _mean,_ did you take a tumble in the hay with him, ‘cuz – ”

Sam groans and speedwalks over to the cash register. She follows doggedly.

“- _’Cuz_ I didn’t see him leave with anyone last night, but man _, someone_ went to town on his neck. I’m paying for both of us, thanks,” she tells the amused, middle-aged lady behind the counter, and hands over her credit card.   

“I wouldn’t – I don’t – ” he says, and fuck, she’s still _here,_ isn’t she, she hasn’t panicked _yet,_ and oh God Dean’s gonna skin him alive for this. “Yeah, okay? We – we’re a _thing._ Or not really a _thing,_ we aren’t _dating,_ I don’t think, but I – yeah. With him.” His face is burning up.

“ _I knew it,”_ Charlie says.

“It’s five-twenty-four all together,” the cashier says. “Honey, if you don’t want trouble later on, you better find out how serious he is about you. Sign here, please.”

“Uh,” Sam squeaks. “I’ll do that.”

Charlie signs the receipt, gives the cashier a cheerful grin, an starts to stride away like one of her closest friends hadn’t just admitted to an incestuous relationship with his brother. Sam trails after her with his coffee and tries to look dignified.

“You know I’m okay with it, right?” she says, stopping him right outside the door. 

“Oh my God – could you please drop it – ”

“No, ‘cuz you look like you’re about to have a heart attack. I’m not saying it isn’t, like, _mega_ weird and illegal, but – I’ve read the books, and unless Carver Edlund had a thing for extraneous homoerotic tension, there’s always been _something_ between you two.”   

“I am going to go back in time and murder Chuck Shurley,” Sam says as calmly as he can. “I am going to feed him his own hands.”

“I’m glad you figured it out, I really am,” she says, ignoring him. “You need each other, you know?”

Sam laughs dryly. “Yeah. I know.”

She pats him on the arm and ambles off to her car.

Dean’s airdrumming along to Lynyrd Skynyrd in the front seat of the Impala. “Took you long enough,” he says, as Sam wedges himself in next to him.  

“Sorry,” he says. The cashier’s advice is bouncing around in his head, and he tries diligently to ignore it. He _could_ ask Dean if they were dating. He could also shove his arm into a garbage disposal up to the shoulder, and get about the same effect. 

“Hey – where’s my M&Ms, bitch? I gave you _one job – ”_

“They didn’t have any,” Sam lies. “Next stop. Promise.”

“You owe me Twinkies now,” he grumbles, but he doesn’t look too put-out by it, thankfully. Sam doesn’t know how he can be so in love with and so confused by the same being.

 

They finally roll into Massachusetts at midnight and grab themselves beds at a hotel in the town where their suspect resides. Charlie tosses them their keys and fucks off, probably to Skype her girlfriend, and Sam and Dean go to crash in their own room, open the door, and –

“What the fuck,” Dean says.

“A single,” Sam says. “Charlie got us _a single.”_

It’s a nice room, if a little smaller than the last, pretty floral wallpaper and sleek oak furniture, a view right out into miles of rocky, mountainous forest, and, in the middle, a single large, comfortable-looking, king bed.

“Sam,” Dean says. “You got something to tell me?”

“What? No! I wanted a double! I bet there was only one room left, and so – ”

“The parking lot’s _dead,_ Sam. You wanna try that again?”

“Look, it’s not – she figured it out herself, okay? She already knew, she just asked me to confirm it –”

“And you told the _truth?”_     

“What – I was supposed to _lie?_ She’s my friend, Dean!”

“And you’re my _brother._ You starting to see why we gotta keep this under wraps – ?”

There’s a knock at the door.

“Don’t you dare – ” Dean starts to say, and Sam rolls his eyes, pushes past him to open it.

Outside, shivering in the hallway, there’s a teenaged girl, maybe four-ten if she’s a foot, with long, shiny black hair and huge fat-framed glasses.

“Hi?” Sam says. “Can I help you?”

“Um,” she says, cheeks going cherry red as she looks back and forth between the two of them. “You guys’re the Bradburies, right? Congratulations on your – yeah,” she says, and shoves a frosty bucket into Sam’s hands. It’s loaded with ice and, in the middle, sits a bottle of champagne.

“Thanks?” Sam says. The girl flees.

“What – ” Dean says, wandering over. “Is that – ours?”

“The hotel’s offering its congratulations,” Sam says, shutting the door behind him. He sets the bucket on the nightstand.   

“Charlie is dead to me,” Dean says.

“At least she’s taking it well?”

“That’s – that’s _worse_ than if she’d – how the fuck’d she find out, anyway? You been looking at me weird, or something?”

“Or something. She just did, okay? And she said she’s fine with it. It’s not _that_ bad.”

“Sam,” Dean says slowly. “You? Are my brother. My _younger_ brother. Who I’m fucking. Oh, Jesus Christ, fucking _hell,_ why would I _– ”_

“We’re _consenting adults,_ dude, it’s _fine,”_ Sam says. “Look, can we please, just. Get drunk? And not think about this for a while?”

“Thought that was my line,” Dean says, falling back onto the bed. “Well? C’mon. Might as well make use of Charlie’s thoughtful gift, here.”  

Champagne, Sam finds, makes him very giggly and lightheaded. Dean, who is not nearly as affected, watches him flop around the bed with a fond smile.

Not one to pass up an opportunity, Sam gives Dean an enthusiastic blowjob crossways across the bed and then fucks him hard enough to make the headboard slam into the wall. He hopes, somewhat maliciously, that Charlie’d gotten the room next to theirs, and she’d been kept up by their intense, athletic sex. Would serve her right, trying to meddle. Or whatever it is that she’s doing.

Sam passes out at some unholy hour in the morning and wakes up an indeterminate amount of time later with his pillow stuck to his face and a taste in his mouth like sugared flowers.

“Ugh,” he says, detaching himself from the bedspread. “Never again.”

He’s hit in the face with dark fabric, wastes a moment untangling it from his head while Dean cackles at him. It’s a suitjacket.   

“Ngh,” he says. “Fed suits?”

“Fed suits,” Dean confirms. “We’re gonna go in and do an interview with that nice old lady, maybe snoop around a bit.”

“’Kay, just let me – ugh.”

Dean’s snickering at him again. “I can’t believe you got plastered on, like, half a bottle of champagne. Just when I think you can’t get any girlier – ”

“Half a bottle is a _lot,_ okay? Some of us don’t drink like it’s our career. Sorry I don’t wanna drown my liver.”    

“Dude. _Champagne._ You want some jello shots with that, or – ?”

Sam drags himself out of bed mostly to get away from his brother, who is as much of an ass as he’s always been. It’s comforting, actually, to think that Dean’d be the same no matter how much their relationship shifted. They’ll always be Sam and Dean, brothers, hunting partners, two halves of a majorly fucked up whole. And that’s okay.

They meet up with Cas and Charlie in the parking lot. Cas is bleary-eyed and comically rumpled, and Charlie’s got the biggest, smuggest grin on her face.

“Nice suits,” she says. “You look tired, Sam. Good night?”

“We? Are going to have words,” Dean says, pointing at her. “Right about now, though, I wanna get this shit over and done with. Everyone in the Impala, c’mon. Speed it up – here we go, gimme some hustle – ”

 

“All right,” Sam says, on the ride over. “If it turns out she’s a witch, what’s the plan?”

"Maybe if we kill the dogs," Dean begins.

"We can't kill the dogs," Charlie and Castiel say in chorus.

"Okay, okay, sorry. Chill. I was just thinking. Christ."

"We're not gonna slice up a bunch of puppies, Dean," Sam says.

"They're not puppies, they're - they're evil, curse-spreading mutts," Dean says. "But, sure, whatever. They're cute, so we'll let 'em live."

“There’s no proof it’s the dogs,” Sam argues. “Probably it’s the lady, right?”

“So we can kill _her?”_

“No! Well – maybe. Depends. We’ll _see,_ all right?”

They pull into a potholed residential street and Dean slows the car so they can catch the house numbers. It’s heavily treed and lined with small clapboard houses, most of them gone grey with mold.

“Number twenty-four, you said, right?”

“Mmhm,” Dean says.

“That one!” Charlie says, draping her upper body over the front seat and pointing. “It’s that one!”

The front yard is poorly maintained, grass grown tall and brown and scattered with leaves, weeds up around the foundation, tangles of unsupervised hedge encroaching over the stone path up to the porch. There’s a wind chime dangling from the stoop and a weathered, moldy wicker rocking chair sitting just below it and, at the foot of the door, a dirty tan rug that reads WIPE YOUR PAWS.

“Oh, yeah,” Dean says, his face drawing into a sneer. “That’s it.”

They bring the car up to the curb. Already, Sam can hear shrill barking, and he feels, maybe, just the tiniest more sympathetic for his brother. It is a little – grating. 

“Charlie, Cas – you wait in the car and keep watch, got it? We’re just gonna go in, interview the lady, and then come back. _Right,_ Dean?”

“Um, right,” Dean says, tucking his handgun into the back of his pants. “Just – talking. Yup.”

“If you lay _one finger_ on those dogs, Dean,” Castiel says.

“Yeah, all right, smitey. I got it. Let’s _go.”_

They pick their way through the hedges and up to the front door side-by-side. Dean delivers two sharp raps to the peeling paint.

“ _Be nice,”_ Sam hisses to him just before the door slips open a sliver.

“It’s you,” says an exasperated voice. “Again.”

Dean’s professional mask doesn’t falter in the slightest. “Yes ma’am, it is,” he says at the door. “Agent Waters, I’m sure you remember. And you haven’t met my partner, Agent Gilmour.”

“Hi,” Sam says, flashing his badge. “We just wanted to ask some follow-up questions about the Bachman pond case, if you – ”

“Oh, stop,” she says. “I don’t have the patience for this.”

“Sorry?” he says. “Ma’am, I assure you, we – ”

“Just get in here,” she says, and tugs the door open the tiniest bit more. “Mind the dogs.”

It’s difficult _not_ to mind the dogs, since they’re already spilling out of the house and onto the porch with frenetic excitement, barking hard enough to throw their entire bodies off course and darting in to inspect the pantlegs of their suits with curious wet noses. Some of them share Dean’s buttery coloring, some of them don’t, but they’re all very loud, very fluffy, and very jumpy.

Sam quirks an eyebrow at his brother, who just wrinkles his nose, shrugs, and squeezes right on through behind her. Right, then. Onward. Sam sidles in after and the dogs follow at his heels, and then the door is closed after them all and he’s trapped ankle-deep in a small sea of bobbing furry foreheads with his brother and an old lady who is almost definitely fucking nuts.

He’s able to see her, now, in the dim, hazy glow of the room’s single lamp, and the low light does no favors to her sunken, tired face, the deep hollows of her eyes. She’s got wispy, mousy-brown hair and thin, severe lips, and heavy freckles across her strong nose and high cheekbones.     

“Wow,” Sam says, because he’s not really sure what to do here. “That’s a lot of dogs. How many have you got?”

“Not nearly enough,” she says, smiling. Her teeth are pearly and small and pointed at the tips.

“Ha _haaa,”_ Sam wheezes. 

“Go on, sit,” she says, gesturing towards a low, stubbly loveseat. “You’re here to talk, aren’t you? I’ll get the scones.”

“Um, that’s okay – it’ll just be a quick questioning, we won’t need to – ”

She waves her hand and walks away, moving easily through the swarm of dogs. They follow her like a trail of exhaust, yapping and pushing to get close.

“ _What the fuck,”_ Dean hisses, as soon as she’s out of earshot.

“ _Dean!_ Calm down! Maybe she’s just some weird old lady.”

“Don’t fuckin’ pretend this ain’t witchy as hell. You see the paintings? You tellin’ me that shit ain’t unnatural?”

Sam hadn’t seen the paintings, but now that his brother’s mentioned it they jump out at him from every direction, all shapes and sizes, frame after gilded frame. Every single last one of them features a small, cobby-legged, vacant-eyed dog. Some of them sport plaques with names engraved into them, though no dog deserves to be inflicted with names like these, _Jinx Wellington_ and _Princess Victoria Liberty_ and _Foxie Moxie._   

“What the fuck,” Sam says. “How was this place not, like, the _first thing_ you thought of after you turned back?”

 “Never went _in_ the first time. ‘M glad I didn’t, too. I’m getting a _serious_ Island of Aeaea vibe from this bitch,” Dean mutters. “Don’t you touch those scones, Sammy.”

“Island of _what – ?”_

“I hope you like blueberry,” the lady says behind him. “It’s all I had left. Didn’t I tell you to sit?” 

They sit. The sofa is covered in dog hair and fucking _hell,_ they’re totally going to have to do dry cleaning after this shitstorm, aren’t they. He hates these fucking suits.

She puts the plate of scones on the coffee table between them and sits on the armchair opposite, watching them with clever hazel eyes. The dogs squirm around her feet.

“Uh. You’ve got a lovely place here, Miss Green,” Dean says, with his most charming smile. “My partner and I were admiring the, um, décor. You paint all of those yourself?”

“No,” she says. She has yet to blink even once. “My great-granddaughter does them. She’s a lovely artist.”

“She must be very talented,” Sam says.

Dean scribbles into his notebook and tilts it surreptitiously so Sam can see: _LOOKS ++ YOUNG FR G GRAND KIDS_ , underlined with a zigzag for emphasis. _PRGNANT EARLY,_ Sam counters in his own book. Dean draws a dick with angry eyes and labels it _SAM._

“Yes, she is,” the lady says, unaware of or uncaring for the drama going on across from her. “She’s got her work in museums.”

Dean grabs the opportunity smooth as silk. “Why don’t you tell my partner all about that, and I’ll go use your bathroom real quick. Ma’am?” he says, moving to rise, and Sam kicks him in the ankle. He _always_ gets stuck with Old Lady Story Time detail, and he’s starting to resent it. Dean can do the boring work for once, and _he_ can go hunt for hex bags and altars.

As it turns out, neither of them are getting out of the boring work. The lady raises a single bony hand and shakes her head impatiently.   

“No,” she says. “You sit down, Dean Winchester, and we’ll do this right.”  

“Wh – I’m sorry, ma’am, you must be confusing me with someone else – my name’s Roger Waters, and I’m – ”

“And I’m Syd Barret,” she interrupts. “Try harder next time. _Sit._ ”

“ _Told_ you we should’ve gone with Counting Crows members,” Sam says.

“Shut it. Whaddaya want, lady?”

“A little gratitude, for once. You boys should be thanking me.”

“Why the _fuck_ would I – you turned me into a _dog!_ ”

She harrumphs. “The incident brought the two of you together, right? That’s nothing to sneeze at.”

“Jesus fucking Christ, does anyone _not_ know about us?” Dean yelps. “Was there a newsletter I missed?”

“Look – Miss Green,” Sam says, compelled for some reason to be at least a little respectful, even though she’s _definitely_ the asshole who cursed his brother. “We just want to move past this, okay? Take your curse off my brother, and we’ll get out of your way.”

 “I would,” she says, taking a scone off the platter between them, “but I don’t feel like he’s learned his lesson yet.”

“My - you know what, fuck your games,” Dean says, and he’s out of the chair before Sam can stop him, gun at the ready. “Reverse the spell, or I’ll kneecap you.”

There’s bloodlust ripe on his face and Sam’s two parts afraid, one part aroused. She doesn’t deserve to die, though, even if she’s being obstinate, so he stands next to his brother and sets a hand on his back, tries to bring him down. “ _Dean._ Hey. Hang on a minute, man.”

The dogs are growling all around the chair, gums bared, their ears gone back. The noise is hellish. None of them stray past the coffee table but it’s clear they’re ready to spring forward as soon as their mistress is hurt.

She pulls one of them onto her lap and shushes it, rubbing its spine, and it quiets, watches the brothers over its shoulder suspiciously.

“Don’t think I won’t shoot through that fucking hairball, ‘cuz I will,” Dean says. “You take your curse offa me _right now_ or I swear to God I’ll feed you a bullet.” 

“Hurt my babies, and I’ll tear you apart,” she says, _way_ too calm for an old lady staring down the barrel of a gun. “Like I said – there’s a lesson for you, here. As soon as you knocked on my front door, I knew it.”

“ _Oh my God,_ I _do not care,_ ” Dean says. “This ain’t exactly my first rodeo, got it? We’ve been around this block, sweetheart, with things bigger and badder than you could _ever_ be, and we’ve always come out on top. This class is fucking _over._ ”

 “That attitude will get you killed someday,” she says, and she frowns, like the thought makes her unhappy. “You’re a stubborn man, Mr. Winchester, and a strong one, but that doesn’t mean you’re exempt from weakness. Remember, please – sometimes you need protection, too. Admit that much, and I’ll destroy the curse.”

Dean thumbs off the safety. 

“Those are my terms,” she says, and nudges the dog off her lap, picks up a different one.

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” Dean says, and he pulls the trigger.

“ _Dean!_ Don’t – ”

Except there’s no flash, no loud bang. The gun sits like a dead thing in Dean’s hand.

“What – ?” he says.

“This is _my_ house,” she says. “You’ll follow my rules.”

“So, what – I gotta say I’m, _I’m as self-sufficient as a toddler_ , and you’ll fix me?”

“I think your brother’d be disappointed if I actually _fixed you_ , but, yes. More or less.”

“This is bullshit,” Dean says. “Total – how about I punch you until you’re sick of it, and – ”

The dogs are bristling at him again. “Dean,” Sam says, quietly.  

“Motherfucker,” he says. “Fucking – okay, fine, sometimes I – this is _stupid._ Sometimes I need help with shit, okay? My shit, I mean. Are you _happy_?”

“Oh, good enough,” she says, and waves her hand through the air like a demented conductor. “There. It’s off. Was that so hard?”

Dean looks like he’s ready to twist her head off her neck by hand. “’M I supposed to trust that you – ”

“Trust whatever you like, Dean Winchester,” she says, playing with her dog’s paws. “It’s not my problem, now, is it.”

They search the house and fail to find so much as a dream catcher. Miss Green does, however, have an impressive collection of small glass pomeranians, set on windowsills and shelves and atop stacks of books. They’re creepy, but not, as far as they can tell, outright witchcraft. Sam pockets one for sentimentality’s sake. He’ll give it to Dean as a Christmas present or something.    

“If _anything_ happens, your ass is grass,” Dean snarls in parting. “You’re lucky I’m letting you live.” 

“Have a safe trip,” she says. “Take a scone.”

Dean stomps out the door and lands a solid kick to the porch railing. “Fuckin’ – I cannot _believe – ”_

“Hey, we’ve got the curse off now, right?” Sam says, steering him away from the house. He can see Charlie and Cas fighting for space at the back window and they _really_ don’t need to watch Dean kick a hole into an old lady’s house, witch or not.

“We _don’t fucking know_ if we got it off,” Dean yells. “We drove _three goddamn days_ for this bullshit. Fuck! Three days!”

“Dude. Calm down. Residential street, remember?”

“All the way to Massachusetts,” Dean says, not quite as loud but still tinged with the same intense offense. “I _hate_ this stupid state. I hate this stupid curse – and I didn’t even get to _kill_ anything – ”  

“Hey,” Sam says, nudging him. “It isn’t all bad, is it?”

Dean snorts and does his _you’re being a sentimental idiot_ eyeroll, but he’s got a smile tugging at his lips. “Yeah, I guess it isn’t. Let’s go home, Sammy.” He sighs, stares up into the sky, eyes gone distant and contemplative.

Sam’s – happy for him. Okay, their lives suck a whole lot, most of the time, and they’ve still got a metric ton of shit to deal with, but there are the quiet times in between – like this one – when nobody’s injured or dying or saving the world, and they can just be.

It’s stupid and clichéd but really, for real, his home’s wherever Dean is. As long as it’s the two of them, they’ll be okay. _I love you,_ he thinks, and what the hell, now’s as good a time as ever.

“Dean,” he says.

Dean sucker punches him in the gut. “Last one to the car’s a little bitch,” he hollers, and takes off.  

Sam sprints after him, grinning.

 

 

**(A VERY BRIEF EPILOGUE:**

The curse does not, fortunately, turn up again. What _does_ turn up are a series of glossy 11x14 photo prints of a small, befurred Dean asleep in Sam’s lap, courtesy of Charlie. These get hung in the kitchen. Dean only protests a _little._ **)**     

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok so i just realized maybe some of you dont know what pomeranians look like???? hold on while i find some pictures
> 
>  
> 
> [AHAHAH LOOK AT THIS SMUG ASSHOLE](http://www.dogspuppiesforsale.com/images_v2/admin/pomeranian.jpg)
> 
>  
> 
> [ i shouldnt be laughing but im totally laughing](https://bellaklein.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/img_6532.jpg)
> 
>  
> 
> [ hhhheheheheh](http://www.puppal.com/images/breeds/Pomeranian/large/lg_0024.jpg)
> 
>  
> 
> [ deAN IS THE ONE on THE LEFT DEANtns THE ONE ON tTHE](http://www.pomeranian.name/foto/vrhy/e/stripek_snu_e_14weeks_IMG_9407_750.jpg)
> 
> [ what the fuck is this lmao ](http://www.petsplace.co.za/pomeranian%20perfect_picture_female_004.jpg)
> 
>  
> 
> (none of these pictures belong to me!!! thank you @ the wonderful people who took them. yall are amazing)

**Author's Note:**

> im sorry if u read this ill make it up to you somehow i promise


End file.
